


Rules for Open Fishing Season

by suburbanmotel



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Blow Jobs, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Emotional Constipation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, Idiots in Love, M/M, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, Pining, Sharing a Bed, Sickfic, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-22
Updated: 2020-04-22
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:14:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,454
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23781415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/suburbanmotel/pseuds/suburbanmotel
Summary: //Careful, Tyler thinks, heart fluttering. Careful, now. Be gentle. Things can break, and even the biggest, toughest things have cracks. Things are fragile and they can fall apart, even when you take care, even when you love them.//
Relationships: Jamie Benn/Tyler Seguin
Comments: 39
Kudos: 259
Collections: Bennguin Quarantine Fest 2020





	Rules for Open Fishing Season

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bisexualalienblast](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bisexualalienblast/gifts).



> Oh look. It’s another hockey fic. How did that happen. Anyway, the finished product is nothing like the original idea, as usual, and while it _is_ a quarantine fic, as in, the Author is quarantined, the sickness mentioned within is not pandemic related in any way. Please enjoy, stay healthy, and hold fast <3

//

I don't need fancy ladies wasting up my time  
Give me tender loving care and the one that's mine  
Make me shine shine shine shine shine make me shine  
With a little luck and greenback dollar you're gonna see me shine.

_~Waylon Jennings_

//

Alligator pie, alligator pie,  
If I don't get some I think I'm gonna die.  
Give away the green grass, give away the sky,  
But don't give away my alligator pie.

_~Dennis Lee_

//

The heart is something else. Nobody knows what’s going to happen.

_~Richard Brautigan, Trout Fishing in America_

//

Tyler buys it on a whim. It costs $25 Canadian and he has no clue why he wants it but he does. He’s standing in a gift shop in Toronto’s Pearson Airport. He’s been here a hundred times before over the years, travelling across the country and around the world with his teammates and his family for hockey events and tournaments, but this time he’s alone. This time he’s 18 years old and has just been signed to Boston. The goddamn _Bruins_. He’s going to play professionally and he’s going to be a millionaire and for some reason this _thing_ , this tacky airport trinket that he spies from across the store has caught his attention. He’s known for impulse purchases, but this is different. It catches his eye and he can’t look away and he stands there in the overcrowded space filled with tourists and just stares at it. He doesn’t know why. It reminds him of something, or someone. Or maybe he’s just tired.

It’s stupid and weird and something he’ll never personally use so he buys it.

It's fragile, because it’s made of glass, and the shop clerk wraps it in a double layer of paper, “So it won’t break,” she says before handing him the bag. He takes it and thanks her and wonders what the fuck he’s thinking. He laughs out loud as he winds his way down the long corridor to the waiting area, a portal to his new life. He’ll give it to his mom, he thinks. Or Candace. It’s pretty, he thinks. They’ll like it. _Someone_ will like it.

Years later, when it finally _finally_ hits him he laughs out loud at the absurdity, how it was staring him straight in the face for such a long time and he completely missed it.

//

He ends up actually forgetting about it for years.

He packs it away still in its airport gift bag, covered in its protective wrapping, in a cardboard box with MISCALANEUS scrawled across the top in black magic marker. It comes with him to Boston, then back home to Brampton, to Boston and back home again. His mom asks him each time if he wants to unpack the box, sort it before he heads back down, but he always says no, it’s fine, it’s just stuff, but not stuff he wants to _throw out_ , you know? He thinks there’s old high school trophies in there, photo albums and some diplomas, yearbooks and shoes and clothes he’s not ready to part with yet, sentimental reasons only because by now he can afford to buy pretty much anything he wants a couple times over.

When he does think about it, it’s occasionally, in passing, like when Christmas rolls around, or someone’s birthday. His mom would like it, he knows, because she likes things like that. Or one of his sisters. He has a few friends back home he could give it to, but he doesn’t. He keeps it and keeps moving it around, wrapped up tight, and every time he checks on it, or comes across it completely by accident, he holds it for a moment, confused, before he remembers. Oh, he thinks. God, it must be broken by now. But when he unwraps it, it never is.

I’ll give it to _someone_ , at some point, he thinks. 

The right person. When the time is right.

//

He plays great hockey and fucks around, like he always has. He likes different bodies, appreciates the variety of shapes and sizes and needs and desires and he gets lonely. _Needy_ , an old almost-girlfriend used to love to call him, rolling her eyes, voice scornful.

 _You’re so fucking needy, Tyler,_ she had said when she’d realized, even though he’d told her and told her that he couldn’t be monogamous. Wouldn’t be. He’d told her and she hadn’t listened and look where it ended up. Right where he’d said it would, with her in furious tears and him genuinely puzzled.

Is he needy? Sometimes when he’s alone, completely alone, those words come back to him, one hand on his dick, eyes closed, imagining someone there with him, making him feel good. Not anyone in particular, and he finishes quickly because he _wants_ to get off, he _likes_ to.

But he’s not completely alone very often because there’s a line of people ready to fill the space in his bed.

Needs and wants and likes. He wonders if there’s a difference and what it means when he allows himself to think about it.

He likes soft, round curves and strong, lean sinew and hair splashed across hard torsos and he likes everything in between, too. He likes to fuck and get fucked. He _wants_ all those things too, he knows. Does he _need_ them? Need implies a weakness, he thinks, while wanting and liking is just unbridled desire. Simple and pure enjoyment and anyone who says different can fuck off.

He doesn’t talk about it, he doesn’t brag, and it doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t mean _much_. It’s a warm body and a quick one-off and he loves ‘em and leaves ‘em and doesn’t think much about it.

Until fucking _Dallas._

He never really thinks about any of it, and he doesn’t think he has a preference until Jamie and Jamie’s body make themselves known, long and wide and heavy with muscle and weight, writhing beneath his, up against a wall after a night of too much drinking and a lot of talking and Tyler thinks it’s a one-off, like so many other bodies in his life, but as soon as he gets his hands on Jamie he knows, he _knows_ , it’s not like anything or anyone before.

It’s months after he’s been traded and he’s past feeling betrayed or pissed off because there’s _Jamie_ and _excellent_ hockey, the best he’s ever played and an easy camaraderie like he’s never had before. None of this is like anything he’s had before.

It’s been months and tonight Jordie has gone to bed and their friends are long gone and Tyler has Jamie pinned to the wall beside the front door, the door Tyler had been about to walk through because it was late and he was supposed to go home. Because he doesn’t _live here_. And he and Jamie aren’t _dating_. Or anything else, yet. Well, they’re friends, Tyler thinks, half coherently, mouth on Jamie’s mouth and hands down the back of his shorts. They’re best friends and they know pretty much everything about each other, but this? This panting heaving alcohol-fueled groping frenzy? This is new.

“Is this ok?” he pants into Jamie’s neck as he works Jamie’s cock with one hand. Jamie’s shorts are unbuttoned and unzipped and halfway down his ass and Tyler’s trying to be quiet, he swears he is, but fuck, if this isn’t the hottest thing he’s _ever_ done ever.

 _Tell me it’s ok,_ he thinks, mouthing at Jamie’s jaw and biting the pulse on the side of his neck. _Tell me. Tell me you like it. Tell me you like_ me.

Jamie moans low in his throat and Tyler can feel it vibrating against his lips.

“Yeah,” Jamie breathes, hot and sweet. He’d been drinking some horrible concoction of Jordie’s all night, three different kinds of booze, maybe four. One ingredient was _Campari_. His lips are very red. Tyler wants to suck on them. He settles instead for kissing his collar bone, the right one, and cupping Jamie's ass with one hand, his cock with the other.

“Yeah,” Jamie says at last, with effort. “It’s ok.” Then he laughs. “It’s good.”

He leans down and kisses Tyler, long and slow, his tongue warm and smooth, his hands big and square and steady, working Tyler into a barely contained frenzy in the dark of Jamie’s living room until Tyler is gasping and coming, hard and frantic, barely out of his pants with Jamie tumbling right after him.

 _This is new,_ Tyler thinks. _I’ve never been here before,_ he thinks. Not like this, not with someone like Jamie, not feeling like this. _This will change everything,_ he thinks.

It doesn’t change anything. In the weeks following they’re still best friends, they still create excellent hockey, they still laugh and bicker and gossip and eat and.

They don’t hook up again. Tyler doesn’t ask, and Jamie doesn’t ask, and Tyler starts to wonder if Jamie even _remembers_ as the weeks pass. Tyler watches him, waits for a signal, a hint, a sign that Jamie wants to again before he realizes, with dawning horror, that _he_ wants to, desperately. He liked it, he likes Jamie, and that like and want is rolling quickly into a huge ball of need.

 _You’re so fucking needy, Tyler_.

But that’s later. This night he’s still telling himself it’s nothing. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s another body, another fuck, another meaningless encounter that feels really good.

Even when Jamie kisses and kisses and kisses him, makes him come so hard he sees stars, tucks him in and zips him up and makes sure he gets home ok, laughing into his shoulder when they stumble on the stairs, almost falling and breaking their goddamn necks. It’s nothing.

It takes him an embarrassingly long time to figure it out.

//

He’s completely forgotten about it, by then.

In the offseason he travels home for a few weeks, visiting family and friends and messing around in the gym with trainers, eating more and getting drunk more often than he should, but working harder the next day to make up for it.

He doesn’t fuck around, doesn’t even think about it. Doesn’t _need_ to.

When he returns to Dallas he decides to clean out the spare bedroom/storage room _finally_ , rolling up his sleeves and going to work early one morning, air conditioning cranked and dogs whining outside the door as he goes in and out and in and out, sneezing and wiping sweat off his face with the back of a dirty hand. There’s lots of junk, stuff he’s hauled around for years, stuff his mom has shipped to him, things she thinks he wants, or stuff she doesn’t dare throw out without letting him have a look first. He sorts and trashes and drinks water and answers texts. Mid-afternoon he finds it, still in the same bag, battered now, and wrapped in a soft old T-shirt for some reason, and beneath that, the paper it had been wrapped in initially in the airport gift store all those years before.

Huh.

He sits with his back propped against the wall, tired and dirty and aching and slightly grumpy but more than a little proud of himself for his tenacity today. He’s been meaning to do it for years, clean out that space. Now he sits, exhausted, holding the package in his hands, knowing exactly what’s inside and wondering, for the hundredth time, what possessed him to buy it in the first place.

He wonders if he has the energy to rouse himself for a shower or if he should just fall into bed gross and sweaty when his phone pings. It’s Jamie. Of course it’s Jamie, inviting him over for dinner and suddenly Tyler has the energy to run a marathon, lift 300-pound weights and paint the entire house. It’s _Jamie_.

He tells Jamie yes, he’ll be there in less than an hour after a shower and shave and he asks what he can bring. His heart is racing and he’s sweaty and grinning but it doesn’t mean anything.

He’s still smiling when he wraps it back up, packs it away again, packs _everything_ away, nice and neat and tidy, out of sight, out of mind, easy as anything.

//

Tyler is bisexual. He’s known this for years and years, has no qualms about it, hasn’t once questioned it or felt guilty. Jamie pings not straight, but Tyler, who is usually so good at reading people, guys and girls, can’t get a firm grasp on Jamie. He’s slippery. He’s private and he’s a mystery, and even after their one-time late night _incident_ , Tyler can’t figure him out.

Jordie watches Tyler watching Jamie with this look on his face that Tyler wouldn’t be able to decipher even if he hadn’t been drinking. It’s a knowing look, or a thinking look. It’s steady and solemn and resigned. When Jordie sighs and purses his lips and Tyler knows he’s in trouble.

They’re at a bar, a rare occasion, and it’s busy and loud, too loud to really talk, but Jordie makes a concentrated effort when Jamie excuses himself and winds his way across the dance floor towards the bathrooms.

“You be careful,” is what he says with a hard stare. It’s not threatening exactly. It’s protective, which says a lot more than Jordie could ever say with words.

“Of course,” Tyler says. He feels oddly stung. He blinks and his eyes are hot. Jesus. He hasn’t had that much to drink. He blinks again and swallows with difficulty. “Of course,” he says again, more firmly.

“I mean it, Ty,” Jordie says. He lowers his beer and fixes Tyler in his gaze, so much like Jamie’s but so very different, too. There’s none of that sweetness in Jordie’s eyes that Tyler loves so much. He’s harder, more cynical. “Jamie is.” He stops, unsure. Fuck. Does anyone know Jamie, at all? “He’s not like you,” is all he can come up with.

“Ok,” Tyler says, not sure how he should react to that. There’s something hot in his chest, lodged between his ribs. It kind of hurts to breathe. The bar is slowly clearing out, slowly but Tyler can always pick Jamie out, no matter where they are, no matter how busy. He’s leaning against the bar now, waiting for a drink, face flushed and animated, relaxed and so fucking beautiful it makes Tyler’s heart hurt. He tears his gaze away and looks at Jordie.

“Look, you can stop worrying because I don’t even know if he—”

“He does.” Jordie leans forward over the sticky table and looks Tyler right in the eye, doesn’t let him look away.

“He’s not as experienced as you, ok? I’m not sure many people are.” Jordie grins, tight, and Tyler rolls his eyes because, yeah, he’s done shit, but the rumours are rampant, and inflated, and some are outright insane. It would take years and way too much energy to sift the truth from the bullshit and no one would believe him anyway. “He’s no virgin, but he keeps a lot of himself locked away. I’m not sure he’s even really been in love. So, I’m just saying, be careful.”

“Are you giving me _permission_?” Tyler laughs, feeling brave, feeling reckless, feeling scared to the bones, scared as shit. His palms are sweating. Fuck.

Jordie leans back. “He likes you. That’s pretty obvious, but I’m not sure you realize how much he likes you.”

“Are you saying—”

“I’m _saying_ , be careful.”

 _Careful,_ Tyler thinks, heart fluttering as Jamie makes his way back to their table, his eyes on Tyler’s face, never wavering. Careful, now. Be gentle. Things can break, and even the biggest, toughest things have cracks. Things are fragile and they can fall apart, even when you take care, even when you love them.

//

Jamie watches and notices everything. Tyler knows this — it’s what makes Jamie such a good captain. Tyler watches Jamie watching and noticing and admires the intensity until that laser eye is turned on him.

“You and Jordie,” Jamie says out of nowhere, two nights after the bar. They’re slumped together on the couch, TV on mute, some dumb reality show neither one of them has been following.

“Me and Jordie what,” Tyler says, but his hands are suddenly slick in the palms.

Jamie just tilts his head and fixes Tyler with that look and waits. He’s very patient, Jamie is, when he wants to be. And worse, he knows Tyler is _not_ , the dick, so.

“He just.” Tyler fiddles with his water bottle, starts picking at the plastic label with one bitten nail. “He said to uh.”

Jamie blinks slowly.

_Pick, pick, pick._

“He’s your big brother, right?” Tyler says and shrugs, one shoulder. “ _You_ know.”

“Uh huh,” Jamie says, slow and thoughtful, never looking away. “He is that.”

Tyler takes a drink and misses a bit, water dribbling down his chin. “Shit,” he says and rubs a palm over it. When he laughs it sounds nervous. This is dumb. He’s never nervous around Jamie. Well, hardly ever.

“It just,” Jamie starts. He purses his lips and looks away. “It looked like a pretty intense conversation, that’s all.”

_Pick, pick, pick, pick, pick._

“He’s just looking out for you.”

“Looking out for me how?”

Tyler closes his eyes, tries to be brave. He grips the bottle tight and starts babbling because that’s what he does when he’s nervous. “I like you. I like you a lot and I like what we did. A lot. And I have no clue how you feel or if you remember it but Jordie knows I like you and he basically told me not to fuck it up or fuck you over or no one will find my body ever.”

When he opens his eyes Jamie is staring at him. “Of course I remember what we did,” is what he says. “Of course I do. I remember it all. Jesus. I can’t _stop_ remembering.”

“Oh.” Tyler flushes hot and bites his lip. “You’ve never uh.”

“Neither have you,” Jamie says, loud, and he sounds both indignant and hurt and Christ what a mess they are.

“This is true,” Tyler says and puts his bottle down on the table with a thunk. “Listen—”

“I like what we did, too. A lot. And I like you. A whole lot. And Jordie’s not nearly as tough as he thinks he is. I can take him easy, so even if you do fuck me over—”

“I’m _not_ going to fu—”

“I could still beat the shit outta him, if he comes after you, so that part you don’t have to worry about, at least.”

Tyler kisses him then, hard, then soft, then hard again, until neither of them are thinking about Jordie or dead bodies or anything other than lips and teeth and fingers and skin and the entire world narrowed to those contacts between them.

//

There’s this thing that Jamie does, during games, when he gets tired, or frustrated, Tyler’s noticed. He takes an extra breath, an open-mouthed inhale and Tyler always thinks he’s about to speak, to argue or make a point, but it’s just a breath and then it’s done.

And when he’s about to fight, Tyler’s noticed, when he’s dropped his gloves and he’s circling his prey, he pushes up the sleeves of his jersey and adjusts his wrist tape, one wrist at a time, and shakes his hands and levels whoever’s on the receiving end of his fists with this look that takes Tyler’s breath away.

Jamie is, Tyler has noticed, in turns:

Very loud

Very quiet

Very sarcastic

Very sincere

Sometimes all of these things within a very short time frame.

Tyler keeps a piece of paper on his bedside table, a long receipt from his last outing to Walmart. He writes on the back of it, all these things about Jamie that he’s noticed. He writes out his list with a pencil worn down to the nub, whenever he thinks of something new, or interesting, or weird, or sweet. It’s a long list. He’s going to need another receipt.

Funny.

Sad.

Sex God.

Enigma.

Jamie, it turns out, isn’t the only one who notices stuff.

//

No one can accuse Tyler of not giving things his all. He doesn’t half-ass much, giving anything he attempts his Very Best Effort. And just like everything else in his life, when he gets sick he goes all in. He just goes for it. Fever, aches, sneezes and sniffles, the whole shebang.

He doesn’t get sick very often, and when he feels a cold coming on he can usually fight it off with giant doses of Vitamin C and 12 hours of sleep or sweating it out in his home gym or lying around all day watching movies with the dogs. But this time it knocks him flat fast before he even realizes it’s coming, and he stumbles from the front door to his bedroom after a brutal practice, dogs whining and nipping at his feet as he falls into bed, cocoons himself tight, and tosses and turns. 

He sleeps and he dreams, weird crazy shit from years ago. He remembers, for some reason, his mom reading to him in his childhood bedroom, a book of poems from a battered book from _her_ childhood. Alligator Pie. Fuck he’d loved those poems. His mom could read them, too, with the voices and everything and they were funny and he made her read them so many times he ended up memorizing all of them.

He misses her, his mom, with an ache and a tug deep under his ribs. His face is hot and his skin is hot and his entire body hurts and his face is wet and he’s not sure if it’s sweat or tears.

He wakes up briefly and it’s not his mom there, but Jamie. Jamie leaning over, close enough that Tyler can feel his breath on his cheek, hot and sweet.

“I let myself in,” he says. “You looked like shit at practice. You need water?” Jamie asks this quietly at the exact same moment Tyler says, much louder than intended,

“Alligator Pie.”

Jamie pulls back, frowning.

“Fishing,” Tyler adds.

“Ok,” Jamie says. He leaves and returns with water and pills and makes Tyler take both before he settles on the bed next to him and Tyler doesn’t remember anything for a while.

When he wakes up again, he’s burning hot and the world is spinning and his head, his large, balloon-shaped, heavy head is filled with lines and words and images from childhood poetry.

“Here,” Jamie says handing him another pill and more water. He’s sitting on the bed next to Tyler, his phone in his hand, light turned low as he reads and scrolls, ear buds in, music playing low enough that he can hear.

“Fishing,” Tyler says again, tongue working in his mouth to form words that make sense. “I’m gonna take you fishing.”

Jamie’s hand is dry and cool on Tyler’s forehead, heavy and solid and keeping Tyler’s loopy light body settled on sweaty sheets.

“Ok,” Jamie says. “Hey, you hungry? Or do you just want Ginger Ale or Gatorade? Or something else, if you want.”

With some effort, Tyler turns on his side. The sheet is twisted impossibly around his legs, which seem to weight 1000 pounds. The only light in the room is coming from Jamie’s phone screen. Jamie’s face is weirdly lit, sharp angles, harsh shadows.

“I’m ok,” he says.

“You still feel kinda hot,” Jamie says. “I’m gonna grab the thermometer.” He moves to slide off the bed but Tyler grabs his arm and holds him still.

“My mom used to read to me when I was sick,” he says. “She had this book that was hers when she was a kid. Famous Canadian poet, he’d even signed it so that was cool. Man I loved that book.”

He remembers them all so clearly, words etched into his deeply fevered brain, on the inside of his skull. He starts reciting them, random and loopy, bits and pieces flittering here and there, nonsensical. Bouncing Song, Lying on Things, In Kamloops, The Sitter and the Butter and the Better Batter Fritter. He used to love to say that one over and over and over.

“Holy shit,” he says suddenly. Jamie leans down, eyes wide.

“What, what is it?”

“There was one called The Hockey Game,” he says and starts laughing, slightly hysterical. “Isn’t that fucking awesome? I totally forgot.”

Jamie smiles, He pulls the blanket up around Tyler’s shoulders. “It’s fucking awesome,” he agrees, voice soft and placating, like he’s talking to a toddler.

“And one about fishing,” Tyler says.

“Yeah. You’ve mentioned fishing a couple times now,” Jamie says, one hand resting on Tyler’s shoulder.

Tyler’s eyelids feel heavy, weighted. He doesn’t ache so much anymore, but he’s so fucking tired. It feels good here, in bed next to Jamie, just like this. The sex is always incredible between them, but this? This is nice. It’s quiet and he’s sick, but not so very sick that he can’t enjoy this.

_Under the bubbles_  
_Of Kempenfelt Bay,_  
_The slippery fishes_  
_Dawdle all day._

“Gonna take you fishing one day,” he says.

“Ok. I’ve been before, you know.”

“Not with me,” Tyler says.

He rests for a bit and when he wakes up _again_ , there’s a white bowl on the bedside table. It smells amazing. He sits up a bit.

“Alligator Soup,” he mumbles.

“What?” Jamie pauses, spoon midair.

“I’m not delirious,” Tyler assures and he’s not. He feels better than he has in two days.

_Alligator soup, alligator soup,_  
_If I don't get some I think I'm gonna droop._  
_Give away my hockey stick, give away my hoop,_  
_But don't give away my alligator soup._

“I know that one,” Jamie says, pleased. His fingers slide through Tyler’s sweaty, slightly tangled hair, over and over, gently scraping his scalp, making him shiver.

“You’re my soup,” Tyler says. “I’d give away my hockey stick before I’d give you away.”

“Thanks,” Jamie says, voice dry, but he’s smiling, Tyler can hear it. He closes his eyes and drifts deeper. Jamie’s fingers keep moving.

“Fishing,” Tyler says, right on the edge of sleep. “You and me. My cottage. It’s a date.”

“Ok,” Jamie says.

“The water there is all different colours. Sometimes it’s grey and sometimes it’s brown and sometimes it’s this beautiful blue.”

“It sounds nice.”

“I’ll show you, ok? One day. Ok? You’ll come with me?”

“Ok.”

“Really?”

“Yes.”

He breathes in and out, slow, slow. And then:

“It’s very blue, the water. So blue. You’ll like it. Promise.”

//

Jamie leaves it all on the ice, all the anger, the unbridled rage, but not the intensity. That he carries with him always.

Tyler’s used to it now, the intensity that burns into anger and rage before exploding into full on fury with fists and snarls. Every fight is different, but every fight is the same, too, Jamie enraged, out of control, fists balled and teeth bared and Tyler always stands as close as he can, terrified and sure this time, this time Jamie will get really hurt. But he’s also mesmerized, in awe of the switch, the complete change from the Jamie who kisses his fingertips and the hollow in his neck, who slides into him slowly, sweetly, to the guy who knocks off helmets and draws blood with his bare hands.

After, Tyler watches him in the dressing room, watches him unwind his wrist tape and strip off his sweaty clothes. Jamie catches him watching but doesn’t say anything. He just waits.

Tyler finds him at home that night, shows up without texting, like they do sometimes. Jamie makes him tea and they watch TV while Jamie does his stretches on the floor. Then they go to Jamie’s bedroom, where Tyler spends an hour fucking around on his phone, scrolling through Instagram and pretending to find other people’s lives interesting, but all he wants to do is strip Jamie bare and examine every inch of his skin. Tyler’s fingers shake and still Jamie waits.

Tyler throws his phone down and crawls on top of Jamie, bracing himself over him, staring down at him. He can see marks from the game better from this angle, bruises and scrapes that weren’t there this morning when he’d licked his way down Jamie’s chest, biting at hipbones and mouthing at his thighs.

He touches, lightly, a bruise high on Jamie’s right cheekbone, two on his chest, one on his bicep, the angry looking scrape on his knuckles, the small gash on the side of his nose. He traces all of them carefully while Jamie just lies there and lets him, eyes wide, breath stuttering. And the entire time Tyler is getting harder and harder, his own breathing speeding up.

“You did good tonight,” Tyler says as he presses his lips to Jamie’s cheek, right on the bruise.

“You,” Jamie starts, eyebrows furrowed. “You find my fighting…Hot?”

Tyler nods like duh. 

“It’s a turn on,” Jamie says, to clarify. “Watching me beat the shit out of other players.”

Tyler nods again, harder. He has one hand on Jamie’s chest and the other on his own dick. “Yeah,” he breathes. Then, “Can I?”

And he keeps touching and kissing while Jamie twists and arches under him.

_You’re so fucking needy, Tyler._

But Jamie doesn’t stop him and he doesn’t call him weird or fucked up and when he slides into Tyler, an hour later, hard and panting and slick, all of Tyler’s wants and likes and needs are all mixed up with Jamie’s and impossible to untangle anyway.

//

It’s been in the back of his mind for weeks, an itch on his tongue, impossible to scratch, something wriggling just under the surface of his skin. It’s weird, he thinks, to remember something you haven’t actively tried to forget.

He doesn’t know why he does it. He hadn’t planned on it, hadn’t even thought about it. It doesn’t look like a present so he can’t even put a proper name to it. It’s still wrapped, in fact, in that old, soft, fraying T-shirt when he grabs it and practically shoves it at Jamie.

“Here,” he says fast, dropping his hands before he loses his nerve completely. “This is for you. Here.” Take it, he thinks. Take it and don’t say a word about it because I might not be able to stand it.

“Oh,” Jamie says, holding it. He looks confused, which is understandable Tyler realizes it looks like a mound of old fabric that he pulled out of a dirty clothes hamper. Well, joke’s on Jamie, because it was in the back of his closet, so.

Jamie grins, shy like he does and raises an eyebrow. “I like the wrapping.”

“Shut up,” Tyler says automatically, nervous like a tic, like he doesn’t mean it but can’t think of anything else to say. “It’s dumb,” he adds, like a warning, because all surprise gifts from Tyler should come with warnings, he thinks. Not that he gives many. His gifts are usually big and brash and bold, like him. A car for his sister, a house for him mom, paying his dad’s mortgage, sending a cousin to school. Go big or go home, right? No one can say he does anything halfway.

“You shouldn’t have,” Jamie says, grinning outright, mock sincere, because he’s a dick and he’s enjoying this. He’s picked up on Tyler’s nerves immediately, of course, reading Tyler like he does, every move, every tremble, tone of voice. He knows Tyler is nervous but he doesn’t know _why_ and he’s enjoying it. Fuck. Tyler rocks on his heels and clasps his hands, then shoves them in his shorts pockets, where he balls them into fists.

Jamie lets the T-shirt fall to the floor at their feet then gets to work on the plain, brown paper. Tyler swallows hard. He hasn’t actually _seen_ the thing in years, can’t even remember what it actually looks like, if he’s being honest, and this is all so fucking stupid and—

“It’s,” Jamie says, holding it so carefully. It looks tiny there, cradled in Jamie’s hands.

Tyler’s face flushes hot and red. This is so stupid. What was he thinking. This is so fucking _stupid_.

“Forget it,” he says. “It’s nothing.” He reaches out to grab at it. Jamie looks up and moves his hands away.

“Not it’s not,” he says, indignant. “It’s not _nothing_ , Ty.”

“Ok,” Tyler says, then, panicked, he starts babbling. “I just saw it, like, years ago, and I bought it. I don’t know. It just reminded me of something and it was before I’d even _met_ you but I had to buy it and I’ve been carrying it around and.” He stops because he realizes he has no words in his vocabulary to describe it, what he’s thinking, what he was thinking then and what he’s thinking or feeling now. It reminded him of someone he hadn’t even met yet? How fucking weird is that? He moves to grab it again. Jamie actually turns his body this time and pulls it closer to his chest, gently.

“You bought it _years_ ago,” Jamie says, like he’s trying to clarify something. “You saw it, what, in a store somewhere and you liked it and it reminded you of something or someone and you liked it enough to buy it and you never hung it up and you didn’t give it away as a present and you kept it until.”

Fuck. Tyler takes a deep, steadying breath. “Yeah,” he says. “Something like that.”

Jamie holds it up then. The light coming in through the kitchen window is starting to fade, the sun is setting, but it’s enough, it’s more than enough.

“It’s a suncatcher,” Tyler says, like an idiot.

“I’m aware.”

It’s a suncatcher filled with stars, green stars and a blue and white skyscape, geometric shapes and swirls, light and dark shades. Jamie turns it this way and that, slowly, never taking his eyes off it. The walls around them are dancing with colours and patterns and shapes, blue and green and yellow and white.

“It’s girly,” Tyler blurts.

Jamie raises an eyebrow and glares at the same time. It’s kind of impressive. “It’s what?”

“Sorry. Yeah. That was a dumb thing to say.”

“Yeah,” Jamie agrees.

“Sometimes I say dumb things.”

“I’m aware,” Jamie says. He pauses. “I want to hang it here, at your place.”

“Here? Why?”

Jamie swallows. “You bought it for me before you met me, so I’ll hang it here so you can, I dunno, think of me when I’m not here.”

“Ok,” Tyler says, but he really means _Anything, for you._

//

Tyler suggested hanging it in the kitchen at first, and then the small window in the hallway, but Jamie was determined to have it in the bedroom, with the huge west-facing window.

“There,” Tyler says, when Jamie has adjusted the hook, evened out the chain that holds it in place. He steps back and stands beside Tyler. He nods.

“Yeah.”

He takes Tyler there, right there on the bed as the sun starts to fall. The suncatcher, filled with stars, refracts the lights around the room, over the backs of Tyler’s bare legs, then across the skin of Jamie’s back and shoulders and spine as he moves and undulates, taking Tyler in his mouth, his hands sliding up and down Tyler’s sides. Tyler holds Jamie between his thighs, knees tucked tight into Jamie’s sides, Jamie’s face tucked tight into Tyler’s neck as they breathe and breathe. Tyler’s hands ball in the bedsheets, white and splashed with blue and gold, water colours spilling across the bed as the sun continues to set and light fills the room and Jamie fills Tyler. Tyler comes with Jamie inside him, hands gripping his shoulder, his hip, one leg hooked over his hip, lips wet, eyes wet, stars everywhere.

//

Jamie’s dad was a big country music fan when Jamie was growing up and while Jamie has no memory of childhood poems, he does remember the lyrics to one song that his dad played over and over again. He hasn’t thought about the song in years, can barely remember it now, but the line, the one line that stood out then, stands out now.

_Make me shine shine shine shine shine make me shine._

“That’s your mom,” his dad would say, smiling soft and fond, about those words. “She makes me shine.”

And that’s his Tyler, Jamie knows, shining like sunshine, shining like glass in a million different colours, all shining at once.

//

“So, you like it,” Tyler says, later. Jamie has cleaned them up and stands there for a moment, just staring at the suncatcher hanging in the window. The sun has set fully and the room is dim, almost dark, and Jamie just stands there staring at the piece of glass and lead, the stars and patterns that Tyler bought years and years ago in an airport thousands of miles away before they’d ever met, because it reminded him of someone.

Jamie smiles. “I like it,” he says. He slides into the bed beside Tyler, naked and warm and pliant, wraps his arms around Tyler and pushes his face into the side of Tyler’s neck, where he’s still slightly sweaty and his pulse flutters. Tyler touches Jamie’s shoulders and back, thick with muscle, heavy and wide and solid.

“I like it,” Jamie says again and holds on so tight it makes Tyler’s bones ache.

//

It migrates around the house, hanging in the bedroom window for months, before finding its way to the living room and then the back sliding door for a while. One day Tyler comes home to find it in the bathroom, sparkling in the early afternoon sunshine, turning the pale walls green and blue.

He blinks and blinks against the light, remembering the day he saw it, how he knew, even then.

Years and years and years later it moves again, wrapped in layers of paper and cloth, another T-shirt, this time one of Jamie’s, when Tyler sells his house and moves into Jamie’s. Then again, once more, years and years after that, when they sell Jamie’s house and move together to a smaller bungalow, bright and spacious, but one-level, so the nurses and caretakers can come and go more easily.

“Well isn’t this pretty,” Sandra says, touching the edge of it with a gloved hand. Sandra is new and, in Jamie’s opinion, a little dumb. “All the pretty stars. Was it a gift from the team when you retired?”

“Careful with that,” Jamie says. He’s lying on the bed, propped with pillows, achy and grumpy. “It’s fragile.”

“And old,” Tyler adds, laughing. “Like us.”

Jamie does not laugh, but he reaches for Tyler’s hand where it lies beside him, takes it and hold it tight.

“It’s kind of in an awkward place,” Sandra goes on. “It must hurt your neck to see it proper. I could move it closer, or to that window over there.” She points across the room. “Can you see it ok?” She turns and smiles at him, big and bright. Dumb.

“Don’t touch it. I can see it fine,” Jamie says, on the verge of snapping. “I’m not blind. Yet.”

Tyler snorts beside him, quiet.

“Can _you_ see it?” he asks Tyler, and Tyler snorts again, affirmative, but when Jamie looks over, Tyler isn’t looking at the window at all. He’s looking at Jamie instead, and smiling.

“I can see it,” Tyler says. “It’s beautiful.”

But right now, years and years before any of _that_ , Jamie is here at the lake, the one Tyler told him about and promised to show him when he’d been sick and feverish in Jamie’s bed, eyes bright and wild.

It’s July, the hottest month, and they’re on the dock behind Tyler’s cottage and it’s so quiet Jamie can hear water lapping at the pilings, can hear Tyler humming under his breath as he loads the small boat tied up beside them.

“What are we catching?” Jamie asks, watching Tyler set the lures.

“Trout,” Tyler says.

“Dinner?”

“Nah. Catch and release,” Tyler says. They’re using barbless hooks. In Tofino, where Jamie has fished for half his life, they wouldn’t dream of this, but here, with Tyler, he can’t imagine doing anything else.

They tool around the lake for half an hour before Tyler finds the perfect spot. They drift for a bit, rods and lines bobbing gently. Tyler leans back, face up, soaking in sunshine while Jamie tries to protect his shoulders and the tips of his ears, which always get burnt if he’s not careful.

“How long we doing this?” Jamie asks. He’s hot. It’s too hot, too bright to fish. They should have gone out first thing this morning but Tyler had looked at him _like that_ and Jamie had been helpless to refuse him anything.

“There are rules, dude,” Tyler says, lips barely moving. “Gotta follow the rules.”

“What rules? What are you talking about?”

“We gotta be quiet and we gotta try for at least an hour before we give up.”

“Whose rules are those?”

Tyler laughs and Jamie laughs, too. Helpless.

“Are you looking at me?” Tyler says with his eyes closed.

“Maybe,” Jamie says, flushing from heat and embarrassment. No, not embarrassment. He’s getting hard in his loose shorts. Not embarrassment at all.

“How do I look?” Tyler says, arching a bit and opening one eye.

Jamie laughs again, rocking their little boat.

“Let’s go back,” Tyler says, sitting up suddenly. He looks at Jamie, right at him.

“Ok,” Jamie says, a little breathless.

“Fuck the fish,” Tyler says.

Jamie nods. “Fuck ‘em.”

They make it halfway up the back of the cottage’s backyard before Jamie catches him around the waist and pulls him down, sucks him down in the shade of the maple tree on the hard, dry grass and roots digging into sweaty skin. He swallows everything, panting, jaw aching, while Tyler finds him with weak, trembling hands and finishes him off while cicadas scream over their heads.

The humidity gathers and swells and breaks in mid-afternoon, sweet hot rain falling in huge drops. They sit under the awning on the deck, drinking beer and watching lightning chase itself across the dark clouds over the lake.

Jamie presses a shoulder against Tyler’s as steady and familiar as it’s always been on the bench, for years now, in the car to and from practice, in a bar, in a bed. He smiles behind the lip of the bottle, just as the last of the rain disappears with a hiss and the sun breaks on the water, shattering into a thousand brilliant pieces across the surface, geometric shapes shining and refracting with colours so bright and beautiful, Jamie can’t look away even when it hurts his eyes.

 _Shine, shine, shine,_ he thinks. _You make me shine._

“I told you, right?” Tyler says, turning to Jamie and grinning that wide, goofy, beautiful smile, that Jamie is helpless to resist. Then smaller, more shy, sweet and hopeful.

Jamie nods.

“We could, like, come up here next year, too, if you want. And like, we could make it a yearly thing if we both want. Well, I mean I know I want to, make it a thing for like, you know, a long time, but I just thought I’d ask if you want to, too, you know—”

“Yes, Ty,” Jamie says, laughing a bit. Then slow, serious. “Yes, I do.”

Tyler exhales, cheeks pink, nose pink, eyes bright under the brim of his hat.

“Ok. Good. You like it, right? It’s good, right? Like I promised?”

Jamie nods and leans over, real quick, presses his lips to Tyler’s, hot and dry, a memory of the past and a promise of what’s to come. He can feel Tyler’s lips curling up under his, can feel Tyler’s hand cupping his hip, sliding around to his lower back under his T-shirt where the skin is damp with summer sweat.

“What was that for?” Tyler asks, still smiling.

“I just love you,” Jamie says, and he doesn’t say it often, not often enough, so it makes Tyler smile even more, Tyler, who says it _every single day_ , sometimes more than once, and who deserves to hear it directed back at him every single day.

Yeah. It’s good. It’s good, it’s all so good, the cottage and the dock and the boat and the two of them alone there together, with the water under them and all around them.

Water as blue as Tyler promised.

//


End file.
